Do you make your players prove to you that they can lift a car in real life before you let them do so in-game? If not, then allow your shy players to roleplay Bards and Sorcerers. This system makes sure that people aren't punished for their real-life short-comings.

I LOVE the threatical aspect of role play. It can be used to overcome the shiness. If you cut it off, the game became in a ROLLING Play instead.

Some times, in some sessions, you can forget about Diplomatic and Bluf skills, beacuse your role playing is perfect.

It has everything! Even the lack of rationality that self-claimed "roleplayers" (which everyone else knows as "drama queens") stereotypically are portrayed as having!

Roleplay and "Rollplay" are not mutually exclusive. They are not two ends opposite of a spectrum. And please do not use "rollplay" as a derogatory term.

Furthermore, punishing people for being shy and rewarding people for something that they put no effort into having is elitism at its worst. It not only makes you a bad player or DM, it makes you a bad person. I know people treat each other this way in this game, but I'm always as surprised and appalled when I'm faced with it.

This is supposed to be a role playing game not a pseudo miniatures game with elements of role playing in it.

If you want to simulate a characters ability to role play then make a base line “this is as good as your character can do” gauge. The old reaction table is fine but some form of limit to how well you can improve a person’s attitude toward a character is better than any iteration of “social combat”.

This is making me leery of what direction they are trying to take the “new” D&D.

I watched the video response to the social combat question. I don't think Wizards is trying to kill role playing at all.

The great thing about a traditional RPG is that you can choose which rules you want to use. It's not like a MOG, in which you have to play by the rules coded into the program. I'd say if you don't like social combat, you are totally free to roleplay social situations as usual.

I could see myself using the social combat rules only in situations that directly affect the story or present some sort of dangerous or dramatic situation. Personally, I think social combat rules will be good for the game.

Also, you could choose to stick with v.1.0, v.2.0, v.3.0 or v.3.5 if you don't like the things that are changing in the new edition. Choice is why tabletop RPGs will always be better than online games.

It has everything! Even the lack of rationality that self-claimed "roleplayers" (which everyone else knows as "drama queens") stereotypically are portrayed as having!

Roleplay and "Rollplay" are not mutually exclusive. They are not two ends opposite of a spectrum. And please do not use "rollplay" as a derogatory term.

Furthermore, punishing people for being shy and rewarding people for something that they put no effort into having is elitism at its worst. It not only makes you a bad player or DM, it makes you a bad person. I know people treat each other this way in this game, but I'm always as surprised and appalled when I'm faced with it.

I have never punished any of my players in the 20+ years of running D&D games for being shy. I see it as if you (as a player) can do a good job at acting in the game but do not involve the other players in it (especially the shy players) you should be penalized for hogging the stage.

I do not tolerate “elitism” in my games nor would I ever promote it.

On the other hand I WOULD penalize a shy player under certain conditions. But a person would have to be doing all of the following for this to apply to them in my game.

1. If they are relying on mechanics as a crutch and if others have tried and are trying to involve a shy person and they refuse to even make an attempt.

2. If they constantly insist on playing high charisma characters but will not try to play them appropriately.

3. If through their lack of involvement they seriously detract from the other player’s enjoyment of the game over a course of several months.

I have NEVER had this happen as many of the “shy” players in my group have (eventually) become the best “drama queens” in our games.

Introducing the Social System into the game is fine as long as it is an optional system. There is no evidence that this system will be neither canon nor a permanent part of the game. Plus this is a role playing game and as such if the DM does not like it he does not have to use it in his game….

So I suggest to everyone, lighten up on this, it is not a big deal. If it gets the “Final Fantasy” generation into pencil and paper RPGs this can only be a good thing.

Punishing people for their shortcomings is about as horrible and elitist as you can get. It's also incredibly hypocritical when you only do it to the shy people.

Not to agree or disagree with you here, but doesn't the game also punish people for real life shortcomings in intelligence? Does the game not penalize poor, or poorly thought out, decisions? Don't physical games penalize people for being slower, weaker, or less coordinated? Granted, many physical games are competitive rather than cooperative, but the point still remains: should a game (any game) penalize or reward a player based upon the player's own qualities or deficiencies? Now, bringing it back to the game at hand, if we grant that it is acceptable for a game to reward or penalize a participant based upon their attributes, should roleplaying games (specifically D&D) do so? If not, should we (and if so, how would we) go about eliminating the inherent advantages that smarter or more charismatic players have? I mean, at that point you're trying to address group dynamics and social interaction and that's really outside of the scope of the game.

That said, I'm in favor of good social conflict rules and I hope 4e delivers. It's something I've been looking for for a long time.

I find it amusing that people are complaining about a social combat system in D&D killing role play when the WoD games - home to the biggest roleplay not rollplay elitists that I know of - has had one for years.

Personally, I don't see the need for a social combat system, I don't think you need dice to do rp. However if others enjoy it, more power to them.

Hey now, I grew up on Final Fantasy and if anything, I feel it's helped my roleplaying.

Their style may not be your cup of tea, but they're undeniably well written and compelling stories.

Heh, even if they did receive horrible translations till 7 :P .

Remember, it's in the dmg, so it will probably be more of a tool for dm's to come up with social encounters quickly than the mechanics the player will be using to actually interact with the npcs (those would be in the phb under diplomacy or its equivalent).

Punishing people for their shortcomings is about as horrible and elitist as you can get. It's also incredibly hypocritical when you only do it to the shy people.

While it its being elitist its not hypocritical. I simply require that players portray their characters in line with the characters mental abilities, not their own. If they are unable to do this than they cant play that character. I dont let someone who has Int and Wis 8 come up with brilliant plans, I also stop characters with Int and Wis 16 before they make dumb mistakes.

What ViolenceInTheMedia said is true. The system already does this mechanically so whats the big deal applying it to roleplaying?

Well again, much like alignment, its all player choice and there has always been the hack and slashers vs cinematic players.

Yes I have been on the end of the ugly stick where your statistical level 19 wis or Int or Cha guy was asked to respond to a question or Woo a maiden or convince a King and they laughed at your rhetoric. "hahaha, is that the best you can up with? And someone else would say, its the best Henry can come up with maybe, "hahahaha" the Maiden spits in your face and slaps you and walks away. Strength, Con and Dex are straight forward pretty much and you roll for success. Anything else requires communication and the DMs I know suck at bringing color to the game with it.

At Conventions, people aren't "required" to roleplay. They have to complete a list of objectives to advance in a tournament. Roleplay is not discouraged, but it helps ZERO to advancing, or so was my experience the few times I played at a Con and so also my friends confirmed when they played.

Again, this is another one of those grey areas where the manufacturers would hope it could be something settled by gaming groups but no, it does not except but a great group of people who take grains of salt with play yet manage the game so one doesn't dogma out the other.

The people who I know play all hate Game Mastering, so they leave it up to the same guy. Our time is precious and there is an X amount of time frame to game in. So we are told to keep talking to a minimum, if to even talk at all because people want to ADVANCE and gain LOOT! And are further reasons why I dont play. As one guy said, DnD is not suppose to be a miniatures battle game with a splash of story line and a "have at theee!" theme.

They way the guys I know play, I am better off playing an MMO - swat monster gain exp and loot to level to swat monster gain exp and loot. Its much more convenient to use with the same results. Just most attitudes online suck and in the end its just farming for: exp, loot, resources.

I think a social encounter rolling system will help roleplay. If you are forced to convince your DM with your own persuasion and not your character's charisma vs the npc's charisma then you can end up with players always resolving conflict with sword because they at least know how it works. If players know what to expect from a defined social encounter system they'll be more likely to use it and less likely to always resort to swords to resolve conflict.

Obviously it always boils down to the ability of a dm to use good judgement, but no dm or system is perfect but at least with a defined system you can have consistency.

I find it amusing that people are complaining about a social combat system in D&D killing role play when the WoD games - home to the biggest roleplay not rollplay elitists that I know of - has had one for years.

Dingdingdingding! Give this man a prize!

World of Darkness has always encouraged roleplaying over dice rolling. Yet they had complex rolls for social encounters (including seduction) since day one. I think honest to God, dynamic social encounter rules are the best thing to happen to D&D for a long time.

And how about this? Relay on the dice, -and- play it out, adding circumstance modifiers depending on the performance if its good?

No. I've seen good games with social combat systems that do not penalize role-playing but in fact enhance it. The Dying Earth RPG is one of the best. It's meant to emulate the worlds of Jack Vance's Dying Earth series, which is filled with con artists who sometimes get the best of people and sometimes are gotten the best of.

So the system has a set of "paper-rock-scissors" attributes for your social offense and your social defense. (Intimidating Persuade trumps Obtuse Rebuff trumps Glib Persuade trumps Pure-Hearted Rebuff (and so on).) Players roll to see who wins and then you play out the scene. This forces people to accept playing a character who can be gotten the best of instead of just always winning through metagame player stubbornness. In this fashion, it actually *helps* role-play by preventing social encounter "munchkinism" and can lead to some really hilarious role-playing situations.

(The system also has an excellent mechanic for resisting vices and temptations that forces players to play the sort of venial rogues that populate his stories instead of the usual trouble-adverse, "sips a single ale for fear of alcohol penalties" PC you too often see elsewhere. It also awards bonus experience for fitting in phrases written by the GM to try to get people to use the sort of florid language in his stories too.)

The key is that you have to be able to step out of Actor stance (where I'm the character) or Pawn stance (where the character is my tool for interacting with the world) into Author stance (where I'm writing the character's story). This is a playing style that many so-called "Dedicated Roleplayers" have trouble getting their heads around but that many find enjoyable once they do. When you start looking at a character as a role in a story instead of "me with powers," it's a lot less upsetting to loose in social combat, but many gamers hate that because they identify far too much with their character as an extension of themselves.

No, they shouldn't be. In my campaigns I've never let people play characters who they didnt try to RP their mental ability.

For the purposes of understanding what you say I'm going to reiterate what I think you said:

(1) You said, that people who make a character concept, but they fail to even attempt to roleplay it, are not allowed to have that concept. For example someone who has an 18 charisma who attempts to roleplay the charisma, but fails to do it properly, is not limited, but the person who makes an 18 charisma person who then acts like a 4 charisma person and then says "Oh, but I'm 18 charisma so I can convince him regardless of farting in his face, insulting him, his family, his heritage, his race, and his existence all in one sentence." At least try to roleplay. If you're just trying to use your stats to ruin immersion, then I'm not going to let you do it.

(2) Otherwise we get to the point of where most of us should all play 10 str, 10 dex, 10 con, 10 int, 10 wis, 10 cha characters right? Because I don't know what a 20 str character should do, so why should I play one? But I know what i can do with my 10 str, so I can tell you want my character does.

If you mean it like I interpreted the first paragraph, then I agree, but if you mean it more towards the second, I wholeheartedly disagree.

I think a 'social encounter' system and role-playing can co-exist quite nicely. the old James Bond 007 rpg had a nice system for that sort of thing and I found that it actually encouraged role-playing among my players, even the more munchkiny types. This was done by my simply asking them to play it out as best they could before any dice were rolled. Even abstaraccting it out was okay ("Okay, I tell the guard a BS story about how I am a Nuclear Weapons Inspector"), if I thought that was the most they do. After doing that a while, even the players who were less adept at role-playing would at least give it a real try, because they weren't being penalized for not having those skills IRL.

So I think a social encounter system is a good thing, not a detriment to role-playing.

It is, actually. A player that is nothing but skin and bones is allowed to play a heavily muscled warrior, but a shy one isn't allowed to play a diplomat. That's a double standard right there.

I simply require that players portray their characters in line with the characters mental abilities, not their own. If they are unable to do this than they cant play that character. I dont let someone who has Int and Wis 8 come up with brilliant plans, I also stop characters with Int and Wis 16 before they make dumb mistakes.

See, that's you realizing certain flaws of the systemwhen dealing with intelligence and common sense of the players, but you still expect shy players to be outspoken during play. It's not fair to put that kind of pressure on someone trying to have fun and escape reality with his friends for one evening. I've dealt with shy players before and made the mistake of penalizing them for stuttering and sweating and ending up asking if he couldn't just roll the dice. Honestly, I felt like utter crap after that and apologized the next day for doing that to him.

What ViolenceInTheMedia said is true. The system already does this mechanically so whats the big deal applying it to roleplaying?

Because just because there's one flaw doesn't make it okay to make everything else flawed too.

The designers know that many players like to keep their social interactions as dice-free as possible. So I expect to see a variant social enounter rule in the DMG that caters to the "all-talk" crowd, unless the system is flexible enough in itself to do this already.

Social encounter rules are useful for those situations where the DM doesn't automatically know what's going to happen. Such situations should have a chance of success or failure for the PCs (yes, I know that success or failure is often more on a continuum than two distinct states). If everything's left up to roleplaying, a tableful of brilliantly articulate players will 'always win' while a table of awkward, shy players will keep missing out.

What I want the social encounter system to be is one which lets the whole party take part, not just the guy with the highest Diplomacy. I'd like it to be one where the path towards convincing the NPCs to give the PCs what they want is sometimes far from straightforward, requiring thought and resourcefulness.

As for roleplaying, I like that to happen naturally. I'd rather not have players who do 'tick the boxes' roleplaying in order to ensure they get all possible in-game benefits. So in my games, an uncharismatic player can have their PC operate at high charisma if they put in a bit of enthusiasm, and if the intention of their actions is in line with what a high-Charisma PC would be doing. For example, a player whose PC is trying to flatter the duke may say lots of cliches, but I can imagine that the PC is using far more polished phrases.

I'm thinking the knee-jerk fear of opponents of 'social combat' systems is that leaving things up to the dice will reduce roleplaying encounters to "I use Diplomacy on the guard" or "I use Bluff", with no further elaboration (like certain unimaginative players reducing combat actions to "I attack the orc".)

The thing is, just because the dice are there doesn't mean the roleplaying element will (or should) be tuned out. Just have the players act out the scene, and don't penalize them if they give it an honest try despite their poor real-life social skills. Then let the dice decide the NPC's reaction(maybe even add a bonus to the roll if the PC's argument was convincing enough).

Sometimes having a rule for something gives you an idea of how to describe it that you wouldn't normally come up with. In my case whether or not social combat rules are used at the table wouldn't matter so long as I had them to give me a kind of instruction for something which I don't entirely understand in real life.

Player "A" (Charismatic Cleric): I believe we should talk to the goblins. There is no shame in negotiating with a foe we cannot hope to deafeat. If we are kille here, who will save the hostages. The innocent villagers should be where our concern lies...

Player "Moron" (Dimwitted Fighter whose player only cares about combat): Shut up stupid (Player "Moron" to DM: I shoot the goblin king. No we can stop all the boring talking.)

So, you see that ignoring the social abilities of characters tends to shaft the players that care about such things.

Note that I haven't read all the posts. The two players described are from a group I used to game with and are not meant to symbolize anyone on this thread. Please remove this post if the tone is too hostile...

It hardly kills roleplaying but it does allow for this sort of thing.
Nate the player is a poor lier but he wants to play a theif, with a high charisma and is a good lier. Should his character be penalised because Nate can't tell a lie to save his life?

Jen, who knows nothing about the issue, has a sorcereress with 9 ranks in profession harlot, and now she wants to make a profession check in order to seduce someone, to get something useful out of them. Should her character who is very skillful in this matter get a penalty because Jen is shy?

It hardly kills roleplaying but it does allow for this sort of thing.
Nate the player is a poor lier but he wants to play a theif, with a high charisma and is a good lier. Should his character be penalised because Nate can't tell a lie to save his life?

Jen, who knows nothing about the issue, has a sorcereress with 9 ranks in profession harlot, and now she wants to make a profession check in order to seduce someone, to get something useful out of them. Should her character who is very skillful in this matter get a penalty because Jen is shy?

(both these are based on real life, game happenings.)

If I were DMing those people, I'd try to convince Nate to have his thief portray the high charisma in another way. Perhaps the thief never lies outright, but is an expert at spinning the truth and evading questions. Nate might find this an easier way to play the thief. I see little point in a player having a PC with personality traits that they're not comfortable in attempting to emulate.

Similarily, for Jen, she could play a sorceress who attempts seductions by being innocent and flirty rather than acting like a harlot. Jen might find this style of play easier to manage. In this case, I'd suggest that any ranks in Profession(harlot) go elsewhere. Profession(courtesan), maybe?

To answer the question, I wouldn't penalise the characters in terms of the rolls for success, but if they didn't make an honest attempt to portray their 'talents', any success is limited. Nate's thief is believed, but he can't leverage any more advantage from this than the bare minimum. The NPC sleeps with Jen's sorceress, but only gives her the vaguest information.

One of the problems I see with a complete "roleplay" portion of the game: the players don't have access to the information of the characters.

By this, I don't just mean that the player of the Bard character hasn't had years of skills in negotiation in courtly matters, but unless you have the most amazing character actor for a DM, the player isn't going to see the same "feedback" from subtle body language from their DM as the Bard is seeing from the King he's negotiating with. Okay, you could add Sense Motive checks to the encounter, but really, if you're doing that, you're already moving towards creating a social encounter ruleset anyway.

The knowledge portion can pose problems in "pure" roleplay too, mainly in that it's hard to introduce realistic failure. Imagine your group are discussing with the King the matter of hunting the dragon that plagues the city. The Bard is probably well versed in courtly manners appropriate to a royal audience, but your player isn't. Are you going to provide that characters player with a book on "Manners for the Court of King Situ" that he has to read before he can roleplay the encounter? Probably not: most "decicated roleplayers" would ask the Bard just to use polite manners in the modern day sense and take it that the Bard is using the equivalent in his "world".

But here's the problem with that approach: how do you judge when the Bard has misjudged his audience or made a social faux pas?

Even the most erudite Bard is going to put a foot wrong on occasion. In a "pure" roleplay encounter, all you can really do as a DM is decide "yes they are" or "no they are not", completely taking the power to have any affect on that decision out of the players hands. Because of this, the tendancy is going to be to allow any reasonably effort at roleplay to succeed in such a case, and eventually having this "I win" button for social encounters is going to grow dull for the players.

Imagine if combat was "roleplayed" instead of "rollplayed": -Player A: Grag the Barbarian charges the orc, screaming incoherent battle cries and foaming from the mouth at the sight of his hated enemies, swinging his axe in an attempt to behead the foul creature. I roll--DM: Stop! We're roleplayers, not rollplayers, so we won't be using dice. That was a very good description of Grag's actions: he slices cleanly through the bone and sinew of the orc's neck.Player A: So all I have to do to win every fight is make the fight sound good?DM: Yep.Player A: So, seeing as I'm a professional writer and actor, the only time I ever have of "failure" is if you, the DM, arbitrarily decide that my description isn't good enough?DM: Yep.Player A: Right, see ya: I'm off to find something that will challenge me beyond a writing or acting contest. I was looking to play a game tonight...

And I think that's something that people occasionally lose sight of: D&D isn't roleplaying; it's a roleplaying game. Games have rules, a structure, a framework. They have ways of deciding success or failure of a course of action beyond judging a competition. In a social encounter where success is judged on playacting, you have the best actor in the group doing all the talking to "game the system", while everyone else shuts up. In a social encounter where there is some element of chance from dice rolling, the bad actor, but entusiatic player behind the Barbarian can interject something into the scene, and then, rather than the DM decide out of the blue that the breaking of the courtly manners offends the King, there are rules that specify whether that is the case.

As a DM, I don't want to be judging my players chance of success: I want to be judging their characters. That, for me, is the distinguishing characteristic between it being a roleplaying game, and just a simple roleplay.

I really don't have much to add, except this: There's absolutely no opposition between Charisma and shyness. Being charismatic means that you have a natural talent in interacting with others, that you will stick in their mind, and that they will either like you, fear you, think that you're creepy, but never be indifferent. Being shy means that you're not using that talent. Not every sorceror has to be a diplomatic oder intimidating loudmouth, he can as well be brooding and silent.
There's nothing bad about having a system that can resolve social encounters. Pure roleplaying means, that the barbarian with charisma 3 is better at it than the paladin with charisma 20 because the barbarians player plays it better out and brings better arguments than the player of the paladin.

I find it amusing that people are complaining about a social combat system in D&D killing role play when the WoD games - home to the biggest roleplay not rollplay elitists that I know of - has had one for years.

Personally, I don't see the need for a social combat system, I don't think you need dice to do rp. However if others enjoy it, more power to them.

Punishing people for their shortcomings is about as horrible and elitist as you can get.

No, it isn't. It's called enforcing roleplay. It's not elitist at all. It's the expectation that someone has their character act as that character can be expected to act based in the character's background and personality. Shy people can do it, but the ones that actually pull it off are few and far between due to lack of RL experience.

IRT OP

No system can kill roleplay. That's completely dependent upon the characters and the DM.

Here is reality, read and understand: Rangers aren't dull or underpowered, in any edition. Fighters aren't dull or underpowered, in any edition. Casters aren't "god mode" or overpowered, in any edition. The tarrasque isn't broken. And you aren't voicing your opinion by claiming otherwise, you're just being a pain. Now, stop complaining. Color me flattered.

I try to keep rolling to a minimum in social encounters, your acting is essentially your "roll". Charisma represents your, well, natural charisma and your ranks represent your mastery of the subtleties of communication rather than how good you are at talking. This seems to result in the numerical values matching up better with what's actually happening.

So a character with 20 charisma and 10 ranks in diplomacy negotiating with an NPC who has 12 charisma and 8 ranks in diplomacy will have a significant advantage in the conversation, but the conversation still determines what happens.

Likewise, that very same character may have only 5 ranks in bluff, while the NPC has 16 wisdom and 10 ranks in Sense Motive. He's not terribly good at lying and the NPC is great at spotting lies so if he tells somewhat shifty lie, the NPC will be suspicious, but if he tells a lie that the NPC has no reason to disbelieve, his natural charisma and basic proficiency should be enough to mask any telltale signs of lying, thus the NPC has no reason to disbelieve him.

If your PC then begins to negotiate with a character who's statistically equal to him, then the conversation will be entirely determined by what each of them say.

You can't simulate combat at the game table, that's why we abstract it so much. You CAN simulate everything in a conversation, it's just the natural abilities of the character in question that are different from the player, and you have to account for that.

It's similar to how combat works I'd say. Your character can be an awesome duelist, but the player still needs to meet him half way and apply his skills correctly with sound tactics. If the player makes an idiotic decision then the superior skills of his character may or may not be enough to carry him through, depending on how tough what he's fighting is.

I think this creates a good balance of interactive story and game. Clearly, you're going to want it closer to one end of the spectrum or the other depending on your style.

No, it isn't. It's called enforcing roleplay. It's not elitist at all. It's the expectation that someone has their character act as that character can be expected to act based in the character's background and personality. Shy people can do it, but the ones that actually pull it off are few and far between due to lack of RL experience.

It doesn't enforce "roleplay", it enforces "acting". After all, who is the DM to tell the player if he's playing his character correctly. It's the player's character. Something that may seem out of character may have deeper roots.

Also, why do you need to "enforce" roleplaying? If roleplaying (in this instance, "character acting") is so great, why do you have to "enforce" it? If it's not fun for the player, why would you force that on him? That said, if your players want to roleplay, rules won't stop them.

And it's not like players will be rolling for every interaction with the NPCs, just the important ones where something of value hangs in the balance and impartiallity is needed (just like in combat).

It doesn't enforce "roleplay", it enforces "acting". After all, who is the DM to tell the player if he's playing his character correctly.

Oh, I dunno, the referee of the game?

Also, why do you need to "enforce" roleplaying? If roleplaying (in this instance, "character acting") is so great, why do you have to "enforce" it?

Because when an orc says "my bad' in character he deserves blue-bolting.

And it's not like players will be rolling for every interaction with the NPCs, just the important ones where something of value hangs in the balance and impartiallity is needed (just like in combat).

I'll decide what's impartial, thank you. I'll also decide what's important and whether a roll or actual conversation is needed to reach the proper goal. I'll allow rolls for unimportant things, most likely, the same way I do now. If you're just a poor conversationalist, well, tough luck.

Here is reality, read and understand: Rangers aren't dull or underpowered, in any edition. Fighters aren't dull or underpowered, in any edition. Casters aren't "god mode" or overpowered, in any edition. The tarrasque isn't broken. And you aren't voicing your opinion by claiming otherwise, you're just being a pain. Now, stop complaining. Color me flattered.